Escaping Reality and Becoming Fictional
Escaping reality and becoming fictional: Originally, people who wanted to escape in some way did so through becoming one of their story creations. This was prior to the divide between the real and fictional or the creation of the fictional realm, and so the character one became was not perceived as fictional at all and perceived to co-exist in the same realm as their creator and audience. However, not all who wanted to escape had any desire of becoming one of their story characters. In this case, they simply wanted to leave the world they know, or the world around them in as complete a manner as possible without dying. Of course, some still utilize the option of becoming a character from their own story—which remains an option (albeit a very obscure, loophole-like one) to this day. With the divide in place, people are provided an avenue of literal and escape from their own lives and bodies in all its possible forms, in order to fulfill people's desire for such a thing. In a completely new realm apart from reality, they can leave their old lives behind in total. Prior to the divide, characters, settings, and ideas from stories were thought into existence in the physical space surrounding their authors/creators, as concrete and tangible entities in the real world. The modern-day escapist: In the present day, being alone or separated from the mainstream real-life culture (and yes, there is one, particularly in this day and age, taking into account globalization and with it near-universal separation between “real” and fictional” as the norm) makes lack of separation easier because one is free from the influence of the real-fictional separate society they live in, leaving only their own inner voice. After all, lack of separation between the “real” and “fictional” = outside of “normal” real-world society and thus analagous to escape from it. This applies not only to channelers, but also to those seeking to escape reality, as their nature as alone and/or separate from the bulk of society makes it easier to block out predominantly real-fictional divided societal influences and instead draw from within the individual through the avenue of their anthropomorphized voice or thoughts. And there is after all, a great deal of similarity and interaction between the two groups. They both contact the fictional realm from the real world and communicate between the realms. Channelers talk to fictional characters, people go to fictional realm and become fictional, then proceed to talk to channelers from beyond the realm/in the barrier between the realms. Tendency towards introversion, against the near-universal extroversion bias: Those who become fictional need to be loners in real life, against extroversion bias majority (extroversion, socializing, having friends is the societal norm shoved down everyone’s throat). In addition, something of practical concern is the necessity for less of real world to be affected, particularly in terms of people, without their presence. Those that lack friends and children will make less of a dent in the greater social scheme of things. That is, no one’s existence will be negated since people seeking to escape reality are childless/childfree by default (that type of lifestyle just doesn’t suit them, as it goes against the point of isolation and requires a huge amount of real-life human involvement). However, keep in mind that even though they are loners in real life, they may not necessarily be that way in the fictional realm. That is, they might be that way out of shyness and wish they were outgoing (in which case they are in the fictional realm), or they may not be able to relate to other people and wish to be around fictional characters that they can, or go off to fictional place where they belong (don’t belong in real life, because can’t relate to real people). Possible reasons for seeking to escape the real world and become fictional: *Wanting a fresh start and to rid oneself of the wrong body, with a new start in a correctly-sexed (or whatever the physical origin of the problem was) one **If they have no other reasons for escaping reality to become fictional, become everymen (because they just want a normal life). However, any other reasons will take on the archetypes of those (e.g. if also bullied or abused, will become a villain rather than an everyman, because they want power in addition to normality). *As form of witness protection. Here, one would have a truly new, secure identity that isn’t traceable back to the real world, because all prior real-life memories are wiped clean in order to have a truly fresh start. **Either become everymen, villains, or rivals (depending on what they want most: privacy (everymen), power where they had none (villains), or an even combination of both (rivals)) *Famous people seeking to escape the limelight at all costs **Become everyman-type characters, who easily fade into the background/go by unnoticed, and consequently have their talents go by unnoticed (because they just want a normal life, to blend in to the background/anonymity, and to be ordinary) *Bullying and/or abuse (this I’d imagine would be especially common for whatever children become fictional) **Become powerful villains and adversaries (because they want power where they had none before) ***Also, the hero/protagonist playing to their villain/antagonist is always similar in some manner to whoever bullied them in reality (Because they want power and specifically power over those who bully or antagonize them) ****Keep in mind that perhaps protagonists bullying villains is already the default in fiction, and the only reason it doesn’t appear that way is because it’s always (with the exception of villain protagonists, who are a mix of both archetype motivations anyway) their side that the readers hear the story from. The audience always hears the story from the perspective of the hero or protagonist and as such, their side is glorified and the opposing made to look bad by default. Even with antiheroes and the like, they’re cast in a more favorable light than the opposing side, and the audience is made to root for the protagonists. *Too much pressure and/or responsibility forced on them—e.g. parents planned out a very specific path, with unrealistically high expectations; or because they have a very stressful job, with all demands and no rewards) **Become stars, now that they’re finally able to flourish with the path that they enjoy *Because fictional characters are the only ones they can truly relate to—e.g. someone who is afraid of people in real life, but fictional characters are “safe” somehow **Become the social butterflies, the 24-hour party people, of the fictional world—now that they are no longer afraid of people and inhibited (because they just want to be “belong” around people, and now it would be specifically around all people) What actually happens when one leaves reality to become fictional: At the very beginning—before anything else—the newly-fictionalized person goes straight to a “processing area” in which they wish their new bodies into existence and have their old lives erased. Traits like personality and skill sets generally remain intact, however. After this, they’re assigned a canon based on a few very basic things like genre and archetype (i.e. what role one would best fit into). One's archetype and best-suited genre(s) are determined by looking over the types of stories and characters one tended to favor and/or identify most with in real life. People’s archetypes are the types of characters they tended to identify most with/most often chose as viewpoint characters when watching TV or reading a book back in the real world. The genre, setting, etc. would all be those that they’re most familiar with reading and viewing. Now, it is very important to consider that once a person is fictional, people from the real world can see and hear everything they do, but only from their new start in the realm of fiction. They don’t know anything about the individual in question's “old life” in the real world, as fictional characters are just fictional characters as far as people in the real world are concerned. They don’t have pasts or backgrounds outside of the realm of fiction, because all those are A) invisible to people in the real world to begin with and B) erased upon arrival to the realm of fiction, in order to sever all ties to the real world and keep the two worlds as clearly separate as possible. In addition, all traces of one’s past or life at all once they have left the real world and entered the world of the fictional, are erased, making it as if that person had never existed in the first place. That is, by having all traces and memories of their past life in the real world erased, they are made no longer real and never real to begin with (erased completely from the real world (including memories and traces of their past), now entirely residing in the fictional world as a fictional character with fictional memories and a fictional background) How is a person's lifespan different as a fictional character? Do they age or die? People age as their characters in fiction age. It completely varies (compare the varying rates from work to work, like The Simpsons versus Harry Potter), depending on the particular work/canon/world (i.e. part of the fictional realm) you’re fortunate or unfortunate to wind up in. Some age (and at varying rates, as well), some don’t. Some even die as their characters are “killed off.” In the case of someone dying in a work of fiction, they are reborn into a new canon. There is no fictional equivalent of a Heaven, Hell, or Hades because many works of fiction are already set in that sort of afterlife. The archetypes: There are three basic archetypes, relating to what the person hoped to gain by through escaping reality and becoming fictional, as well as the characters that they had identified most with as a reader/viewer. They are based on what the person’s motivation upon first entering the fictional world is. Motivations can, and often do, overlap: *I just want to be normal (normality) *I just want to belong (belonging) *I just want to be free (freedom) Category:Channelers of Liminality verse